


planetarium

by cephea



Category: Gatchaman Crowds
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-03
Updated: 2015-01-03
Packaged: 2018-03-05 03:05:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3103244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cephea/pseuds/cephea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>the earth keeps spinning and the stars keep shining and - </p><p>(canon-compliant collection of drabbles addressing narrative gaps in the series. schrodingers cat status of completion. second person pov.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. utsutsu pov; utsutsu/hajime, hajime/sugane

**Author's Note:**

  * For [revolutionator](https://archiveofourown.org/users/revolutionator/gifts).



> to my dearest vector, happy birthday, merry christmas, and i hope you have a sparkling new year!
> 
> (to all audience members - anxiety is a recurring thematic element in this collection, please use discretion and keep yourself safe!)

 

 

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The sunlight filtering through the window pricks warm against your cheeks and flits sparkles on your eyelids and you let the peach-tangerine-sweet diffusion of colour roll across them, fluttered, hurried, as you listen to Sugane shuffle quietly in the kitchen. With your eyes closed, you can hear the exasperated huffs burst past his lips; you imagine them puffing out cold and disdainful smoke against the humid summer curtains of heat in morbid reverse. It sounds like he might be trying to make tea, but the inelegant clinking in his hurried movements betrays the fact that he isn’t supposed to be here right now and you.

You feel almost as if you aren’t supposed to be here right now, either. Despite checking your phone so many times you had OD lowering it down away from your face, despite taking more time tying your hair into braids and undoing them and doing them and. The anxiety shows in the gentle kinks it left behind even though you settled into thick pigtails draped into a tangled mess in your lap. But you know you aren’t wrong, you were supposed to be here, and Sugane knows that too. That’s why he’s padding over to the table in the living room with a tray for tea and an overly sympathetic look you know well enough not to open your eyes for.

"Here, I’m so sorry, I wish I could stay to keep you company, but I’m already late- "

"It’s fine," you whisper, unsure if it’s true but knowing it fits right in the conversation.

"Please feel at home, don’t worry about being here without her, you belong just fine," he starts, and it feels like the white-too-hot burn from staring at the sun too long, deep and oppressive even if you squeeze down tight, so. You open your eyes to look at him.

Predictably, he’s blurry, and a miniature sun has replaced his facial features.

"Here," he says, leaning forward on his knees to pass off your cup to you, but you still can’t properly control your depth perception, and the mismatch of it has your hands knocking together and.

You freeze.

Because you know which hands have touched, know the feeling of your thumb probably burnt more on his skin than the tea that spilled over. And he’s cooing reassurances at you as he wipes it down but it’s back to wet puffs of your breath against your lips and they’re suddenly chapped and cold and there’s no warmth left you think, but. He cups both hands around yours and ducks his face in just that extra bit closer past comfortable and the center field of your vision is clearing up like flitting clouds and you seem him a little embarrassed a little awkward and gentle gentle gentle and.

"It’s really fine."

"Okay."

"Here’s your tea."

"...Thank you."

And he leans back out from you and into his rhythm, chattering away like nothing has happened but now that you’re watching the rippling still in your cup, it’s hard to catch the words.

"...... s my fault anyway ... such a hurry..... again I’m so .... I’m so.... Utsutsu?"

"...Sorry?"

"Ahaha, no it’s nothing, you just looked worried for a moment."

Before you can remember what part of the conversation goes next, the door flies open.

"UTSUTSU!!!! I’M SO SORRY!! I went out to get those sweets you really like at that bakery we went to three weeks ago and it was so packed!! There was some kind of event or something, I promise I didn’t forget I’m so glad you’re still here!! Are you okay was senpai nice to you?"

"Honestly, Hajime..."

“Wahhh!! Senpai! You made tea!"

"Now that you’re here, you might as well have mine, I really do have to get going," he’s standing up to walk up, but stops a step away to turn and smile back at you, "feel better okay?"

While he disappears with a half-hearted "I’m off," Hajime is plopping down next to you. She sets the tea sweets out with the tea set Sugane has left behind but stops before settling comfortably like you are used to seeing.

"Utsutsu, I really am sorry for being late. If I had known it was going to be like that I would’ve stayed to wait for you and we could’ve gone together."

"....I would’ve liked that better..."

"Aaagggghhhhhhh," hands fisted in hair and frustration spiking out in waves, "you just seemed so uncomfortable in the crowd last time I thought it would be nice to stay in this time and do something quiet together insteaaaaad-"

"It’s fine."

"Hm?"

"I would’ve liked it better if you were here earlier but, it’s okay, that you’re here now...."

She exhales something heavy in her chest and it reminds you of the burden she can’t shake off hanging there.

"Then!! Let’s just pack all this up and watch a movie in my room!"

She smiles and it’s that spilt tea schorching down your throat to settle around your heart, and the miniature sun hovers behind her to light the darkest parts of you to twilight, and when her hands brush yours to put your cup back on the tray it burns.

You follow her to her room as she prattles off what the store had been like and which customers had gotten what and what kinds of messages she got from friends today and you feel realize the familiarity of it is something that belongs to her and Sugane both now, a blended mess of what they sounded like alone. Think of the way sometimes when you type now it looks like reading messages from Jou or OD. The way no one can tell which member updates the homepage.

You follow her until you reach the same place.

 

 

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	2. utsutsu pov; utsutsu + jou

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> note: the uranus symbolism in general can often include sexuality, but that element is not meant to be applied to the context of this relationship. please read it more as an ever-complicating exchange of life force.

 

 

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Jou’s got arms settled around your waist but you’re so small in his lap that his hands curl over on his elbows. His fingers are tapping out the pulsing rhythm you feel echo in your ears and you mimic it on instinct before accidentally turning the page on the e-reader you’re leaning on pulled-up knees.

“We didn’t need that one, then?”

His voice is so like smoke you can almost see it swelling out around you in loose cloud curls, billowing, billowing, almost smell it sharp and dry deep in your nose before you remember he’d agreed to no cigarettes for reading.

“Accident,” you say, turning the page back and shifting your hand to tap his pulse against a part of the surface that won’t react.

“Mm.”

But three breaths in, as low as your gut goes, OD had said, to teach you both to relax, and you’re turning the page forward again.

“We really didn’t need that one.”

“No,” you agree, because neither of you is fond of Shakespeare and less so when the translation feels more like your brain is split in six bodies than one tucked in warmth for a midsummer night’s dream.

But you’re both spectacularly bad at turning away Sugane when he’s passionate and OD had said something about how the two of you had the impulse control of Uranus and you might as well read about your moons and the breeze lifts the heat of your frustrations out twirling out into the open air. So you blink the next page into focus and keep breathing.

The chapters flicker by like the stars that light their pages and sometimes between them you’ll look up and trace constellations with your line of sight, find the ones the faeries would see, the ones your textbooks know, the ones Pai-Pai whispers about in hushed drunken lullabies of faraway galaxies. No matter how long you take to finish each last sentence, Jou waits, solid and warm against your back.

You keep breathing.

 

 

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	3. pai-pai pov; pai-pai + hajime

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a recurring question amongst gatchaman crowds fandom was: in what way can we explore hajime as a faceted, flawed character without reframing her as being wrong or removing her agency and strength in the text? this is a little bit of rumination on that from my standpoint.

 

 

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“Hey, pass me another gluestick.”

“Are you out already, leader?”

“I-It’s not my fault I don’t have your absurd dexterous human fingers!! I’m only using as much as I need, personally, to get these god forsaken cardboard trash slivers to stick to these hell fold-outs you call new years cards, and if that’s somehow different from how much you need then it is absolutely not-“

“Here you go!”

Hajime passes you a gluestick, the finicky purple kind that dries clear before you can even think to use it most times, and while you thank the heavens she’s deigned to cap it before passing it to you, it doesn’t help the fact that the entire outer tube is tacky with leakage and coated with scrap paper and glitter. You grimace. Yank the cap off.

You’re halfway through putting inane polkadot cardstock borders on Hajime’s favourite geometric snowflake patterns when you notice she’s not. Her hand has stilled mid-snip and her eyes have gone winter pond on you.

“Hey! Hey, you, what’s wrong!”

But there’s no response other than her wrist twisting down with the weight of the scissors, limp and useless. You start waving your sparkle concoction back in forth in front of her face, vindictively hope some of the glitter flies off into her eyes for ignoring you.

“HA-JI-ME!”

“Ah! Sorry! Did you need another glue stick?”

“You weren’t out quite that long, newbie.”

Her smile twists a little like Sugane looks when he’s not getting his way, and for a moment you think it’s the nickname, you’ve ruined everything with her again, starting over like a morbid console reboot cycle, knowing it still works somehow, just keep turning it off and on and off and on and. Then you realize she had her eyes closed when she looked at you. It’s not about you at all.

“What was Ka- what did. What did you hear?” you say, tongue thicker than the dry roof of your mouth can bear.

“Mmm. Are you sure you want me to tell you?” Snip, snip, snip, snip, shaking hands and jagged lines.

“……..Yes.” She’s still again, statuesque and crumbling and you hate it, want to take the shimmer pens on the table and drive them into the cracks, pound away at the marble until it’s a pile of dust and you find her scared and alone inside.

She turns to look at you, thoughtful, trepidation in her quivering wrists. (You want to find her inside. But you don’t want anything else to come out.)

“Really mean things about you!! Some of them aren’t true but mostly even when they are it’s all out of context or outdated or unimportant in the first place!!”

And you want to run, frantically, flight in your shoulders and your knees, desperation dripping out like poison from your claws, but. If Hajime can put herself, stoic anxiety and tacky fingers and hairspray-blowdried hair and all, on display for you, you can manage to look. (Nothing else is going to come out; she still calls you leader.)

“I’m sure it’s nothing you haven’t heard from me anyway. I don’t care if you hear.”

“Mmm.”

“….Do you always tell when people ask?”

“No,” she leans back on her hands, away from the project, away from you,  “sometimes if Rui or OD ask I’ll say ‘good!’ or ‘bad!’ but….”

“Why me then?”

She meets your eyes again and all you can think is, there are two of you there, two of you and that look shouldn’t be so empty, and –

“Well, it’s. It’s different for you, isn’t it.”

You pass her the rhinestone pack, leftovers from when she painted the galaxy on her soul and you felt the weight of the universe stir in your gut.

“It’s. You’re, you’re okay now. Hajime.”

She takes one off, fractal light dancing on her finger where its balanced, puts it on your nose. Laughs when you wiggle it irritatedly and rainbows spill across the table. You laugh too when you start seeing rainbows spill out of her mouth.

“I know!”

 ****

 

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	4. pai-pai pov; pai-pai/OD

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> note: this chapter is entirely from the drunk pov of pai-pai, so if alcohol is a concern subject for you, this chapter is one you should skip. there are passing mentions of sexuality present here, but nothing explicit in nature happening on screen, so make the best call for you with that knowledge.

 

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OD’s laughter, you think, knocking your paws into the booth edge hard trying to reach for your glass, is probably the best sound. Which is, and ow, fuck that hurt, a lot of things to be better than, especially considering there’s also OD singing, and OD talking, (and OD murmuring and moaning and) wow you feel a little dizzy.

OD is still laughing.

“Do you need a little help?”

OD has got on probably damn near thirty necklaces (and you remember counting them before you started drinking but you lost track of the necklaces probably around the same time as the shots but that’s not really the point, you think.) Every cycle of the disco ball above you showers of pink and red refracted light and it keeps fucking shattering on impact across OD’s skin from the jewelry and that low-cut sweater is doing only you favors, probably (and your vision is definitely blurry enough that every warm pooling, splotching colour across OD’s neck and collar bones looks like something completely else entirely and) you nearly drop your drink when your hands brush.

“Ahaha, you really do have to be more careful with that you know.”

“Fine. ‘M fine.”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure you are.”

The room is fuchsia and hot, god it’s so hot you wish you could take off your own skin, and OD is still wearing leather pants, green patent, special for the occasion you remember (and then you’re looking down at them, remembering how much a tighter fit they are than the black pair and your mouth is so dry) you bury your face in whatever cocktail OD had ordered in for you this time, ice cracks splintering open like your migraine in the heat. It’s citrus and bubbling and wretchedly neon green and it feels like you’re drinking whatever noxious chemical makes the fluorescent tube lights in the lobby aquarium blue.

You feel like that, too, head just above the water, buoying back and forth, up and down, sky and teal blurred together like some gradient graphic of Hajime’s weird as shit art blog-style wallpaper job and you’re still swimming in yourself, eyes watering and sounds phasing in warbled and distorted when you tune yourself back in to OD’s voice.

“Hey, what song did you want to sing next?”

“Aren’t. Aren’t you the one. ‘inging?” you say, hoping that was less than three hiccups. Or like, atleast not in the middle of words? You try to focus in on OD’s face, red from drinking and temperature and the luminescent room and looking at you, _OD is looking at you and_ god the edge of the seat is digging into your ass?

“What was the point of coming all the way out to karaoke if you weren’t going to sing with me?”

“Lissen to you. ‘nd drink. Besides I. Did that, before?”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes! And. Is the last time I’m. Drinking for the year!”

OD scrolls through the songs lazily, long fingers sliding with ease, rings flickering like last week’s Christmas lights and lands on some saccharine sugar-pop idol song you caught Sugane and Haijme singing together two weeks ago and the backdrop is pulsing geometric cotton candy and the pulsing shifts to the back of your eyelids until there are spiraling circles everywhere you look (and OD slides a hand under your jaw, a thumb just inside your mouth to guide your eyes back to make contact and OD’s eyes are literal rubies, treasure and desperation spilling out of you just being watched and)

“You should be more careful saying that, you know. Midnight passed by a few minutes ago.”

“Fuck.”

“I’ll let you off just this once,” and then OD is sliding forward, leaving a glitter lipstick kiss on your forehead, picking you up and settling you into a cushion of thighs and your claws are clinking like windchimes against your cup, you can’t still them if you tried, and then that’s being lifted out of your paws and being placed on a coaster with one last clinking melody, ice now left to melt alone.

OD is laughing again.

It’s like all those well-wishing celebrations you skip out on for New Years, avoiding explaining yourself now just the excuse to dodge spending the night with kids clamoring for the future when you’re still sunk out in the past, lost adrift in a sea of white-bright stars always sliding past, dizzy, dizzy, dizzy on loop like a broken planetarium. (OD’s laughter is ringing bells and clapping hands and smiling through puffs of frozen breath without ever needing to commit to who you’ll be this year and) wow.

You let all the colours and shapes and warmth twist up like transformation and hope you can keep being you this year, too.

 

 

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End file.
